Microsoft Office Coming to iPhone, iPad in 2013

New information backing up rumors that iOS-compatible versions of Microsoft's Office suite are coming in early 2013 surfaced when The Verge claimed to see previews of mobile versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint. Unfortunately, it appears the apps will offer very few features beyond limited editing, and will also require an Office 365 subscription.

Office for iOS apparently coming in February 2013

Unnamed sourced toldThe Verge that Microsoft plans to offer free apps for viewing Office documents, and that editing will be available only to Office 365 subscribers. Those editing features won't, however, offer nearly as many features as the desktop versions of the Office suite.

The sources also said Microsoft is targeting iOS first, and will follow up with Android versions of its apps a few weeks later.

Microsoft still hasn't officially confirmed Office for iOS features or when the apps will be released, but representatives have verified that the apps really are in development.

For a hint of what Microsoft might have in mind, examine OneNote for iOS. It’s good, really. But it’s barely a shadow of OneNote on a proper Windows tablet with an active digitizer stylus. I do prefer MS Office 2011 on a Mac, but going mobile, I just bought a Windows 8 RT slate. My iPad is gathering dust already. Sucks that Apple didn’t have the stones to make Pages properly compatible with .docx.